Recommended Sheet Music,
Introducing SAM-Klang
Hal Leonard Europe have recently published an exciting new collection for choirs: SAM-Klang. Conceived by Danish arranger and conductor Morten Schuldt-Jensen, the name SAM-Klang combines the three voice parts from the arrangements – Soprano, Alto and Men – with the Scandinavian and German words for ‘sound’ to create the word ‘sound together’ or ‘harmony’. SAM-Klang provides a solution to the issue that many choruses face: a lack of low voices, and in particular, tenors.
Offering basic and advanced choral repertoire, the collection offers essential parts of the classical German, Scandinavian, French and English SATB repertoire carefully and considerately reworked for SAM. The arrangements retain the timbres, characteristics, and features of the original works, resulting in pieces which sound nearly unchanged to an audience. Piano reductions of all choral movements facilitate rehearsal preparation.
The arrangements offer development opportunities for all voice sections, bringing new life to SAM choir work. SAM-Klang ensures that mixed choirs who face challenges in finding singers for all male voice parts continue to have access to well-loved repertoire. This significant new seventeen volume series will expand rapidly and promises to very quickly become a popular choice for choirs.
Find out more below, or browse the full series here.
SAM-Klang: Latest Publications
This collection features five of the most popular choral works from the English Madrigal School, a brief period from the 1580s to the 1620s that followed the arrival of Italian secular polyphony on English shores. The style was imitated and developed using English text, especially in sonnet form, during the reigns of Queen Elizabeth I and James I.
A collection of Classic British Anthems and English Carols are also available here.
Available Format: Sheet Music
This collection of six sacred works by the best-known Danish choral composers of the 19th and 20th centuries is a journey through 100 years of development in Danish choral music. Stylistically, the works span an arc from Niels W. Gade’s High Romanticism, through P.E. Lange-Müller’s late Romantic tonal language around the turn of the century, to two motets written only four years apart, in 1936 and 1940: one by Knud Jeppesen, and Bjørn Hjelmborg.
Available Format: Sheet Music
In many parts of the world, Advent and Christmas carols have become part of the standard repertoire of popular songs, and this tradition has also produced a large number of such songs in German-speaking countries. This first volume of German-language Christmas carols brings together carols from a broad range of eras, origins and styles.
Available Format: Sheet Music
All together, Fanny Hensel wrote over 400 compositions, including many songs. The songs in this volume are characterised by a yearning melancholy, and sometimes sad tone. They are technically outstanding, with a strong sense for colourful harmonies and their emotional effect.
Available Format: Sheet Music
These popular, folksong-like and yet ingenious four-part “songs to sing in the open air” form a significant part of the composer’s oeuvre, and he returned to the genre throughout his whole life. Volume one includes a selection of songs from Opp. 59, 41, and 100.
Available Format: Sheet Music
The 29-year-old Franz Schubert composed his German Mass (D 872) in 1826 at the request of Johann Philipp Neumann, who also wrote the text with the original title “Songs for the celebration of the holy sacrifice of the Mass”. Its name derives from the the fact that – unlike most sacred works of that time – the German language is used.
Available Format: Sheet Music
Die Schöpfung is not only a decisive high point in Joseph Haydn’s career as a composer, but also marks a turning point in the history of the oratorio in general. On the threshold of the 19th century, Haydn broke with the traditional dominance of arias, gave the chorus much greater importance and thus paved the way for a new ‘chororatorio’ – one of the main pillars of the up-and-coming bourgeois concert life.
Available Format: Sheet Music
The arrangements in this collection represent 80 per cent of Duruflé’s entire a cappella œuvre, with three from the four Quatre Motets sur des thèmes grégoriens Op. 10 alongside Notre Père Op. 14.
Available Format: Sheet Music
This collection, created in 1888, is Johannes Brahms’ last collection of secular choral songs. Originally for four-to-six parts, these sonorous choral works are striking for their rich harmony and double-choir polyphonic effects, traits more frequently found in his sacred works. The compilation of the texts testifies to the 55-year-old composer’s growing awareness of the transience of nature and life.
More Johannes Brahms SAM-Klang arrangements are also available here.
Available Format: Sheet Music
Mozart’s Requiem, his last and unfinished composition, is one of the most famous choral works in the classical repertoire, a masterpiece whose genesis in several respects is shrouded in mystery.
More Mozart SAM-Klang arrangements are also available here.
Available Format: Sheet Music
Morten Schuldt-Jensen
Morten Schuldt-Jensen is a professor of choral and orchestral conducting at the Freiburg University of Music and former choral director of the Gewandhaus in Leipzig (1999–2007). In addition to his teaching activities, he has worked in Scandinavia and Germany with well-known European ensembles such as SWR Vocal Ensemble, RIAS Chamber Choir, the Gewandhaus Orchestra and the Akademie für Alte Musik. He performs regularly with his Danish choir Sokkelund Sangkor, with the Immortal Bach Ensemble and the Leipzig Chamber Orchestra, of which he is chief conductor and artistic director.
Meet Morten Schuldt-Jensen, the arranger of Hal Leonard’s SAM-Klang editions, below.
Ellena Taylor - Sheet Music and Books Manager
